One hundred years ago, Iran's monarch, Mozaffar din Shah, was forced to capitulate to popular demands for a constitution and a parliament.

Iran's constitutional revolution of 1905-11 was a national struggle for democratic government, the rule of law and a limit on the monarchy's powers. It was the first political reform movement of its kind in the Middle East and was waged against the corrupt and indolent Qajar dynasty, which had sold Iranian assets on the cheap to Britain and Russia in the form of foreign concessions.